


hallucinatory

by whitfox



Category: Dying Light (Video Game)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-14
Updated: 2020-06-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:46:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24714793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whitfox/pseuds/whitfox
Summary: In the beginning, I never imagined that one day I would reach for Racine's face and receive a kiss with blood and tears.
Kudos: 1





	1. beginning

**Author's Note:**

> A very personal novel.

With his back to the sun in the brilliant golden sky, I couldn't see his face, but I guessed he must be smiling.  
Laughing, then leaping.  
I jerked awake, sweating profusely and still panting in panic. Racine, sleeping next to me, was startled awake by me, reached out and wiped the sweat from my forehead and asked, "Hey, what's up, having a nightmare?"  
"A very scary dream." I smiled at him, brain twisting spasmodically, Racine's face unreal and real and unreal in front of my eyes, gradually laced with blood, mingled with the infected's slimy brain fluid. I pressed down on my temples, trying to wake up the still-drowning me, Racine hadn't jumped off the cliff, he was beside me, in the pajamas he'd swept out of an apartment, his juvenile face looking at me worriedly, no, no, he hadn't jumped, wake up, wake up.  
Racine brought a glass of water from the table and handed it to me, and instead of drinking it, I went to the window and poured it directly over my face. It was also raining outside the window, and in the rain, I saw two night demons wandering outside our safe zone. Thanks to the UV lights, they couldn't get in and over time began to ignore us, and as long as we didn't go out, the place was perfectly safe at night.  
The water was ice cold and just sobered me up quite a bit. I looked over to Racine, the parkour boy looked like a high schooler after taking off his adventure suit, and with the floppy pajamas, it looked adorable, and I was glad I'd snuck it back in the first place. He walked over to me, pressed his forehead against mine, frowned and wiped his brow for a moment and said, "Are you running a fever? Did you get bitten by an infected person during the day?" As he spoke, he began to strain to peel back my clothes to see if I was hurt or not.  
I hurriedly grabbed his hand and smoothly pressed him against the windowsill and whispered, "It's okay Racine, I just had a really bad dream and now that I'm awake, it's okay."  
"Tomorrow we have to hurry back to the tower, you have to show Lena." Racine frowned, "Is the headache starting again? There's morphine in here, Crane you-"  
"Shh," my mind was muddled, maybe really feverish, and my hands didn't even have the strength to hold Racine, "It's okay, Racine, it's okay, just get some sleep."  
Racine pushed me away and grabbed my hand as if he was afraid I wouldn't make it. He cursed through gritted teeth and pushed me onto the bed, crouching down in front of the medicine chest to quickly rummage through the contents.  
My eyes began to blur, a headache cracked, and I slumbered again to the sound of the reverberating rain in the wilderness. This time I didn't have any dreams and woke up to the sunlight beating through the window on the edge of the bed and Racine sitting there, blocking out a shadow for me.  
He removed the ice pack I had on my forehead and complained, "You had a high fever the second half of last night and I almost thought you were going to become infected. I didn't think you'd get a good night's sleep. Jesus Christ, I haven't slept all night."  
"Sorry, Racine, I..." I sat up and rubbed my head. The cervical vertebrae and hand bones let out disgruntled grunts together, ignored by me. Everything around me was so real and familiar that I was beginning to suspect that last night was nothing more than a hundred boring dreams, you know, people who live in the end times are always a bit neurotic and have seen too much life and death, and the lines between life and death begin to blur.  
Racine grunted and tossed me a piece of bread, himself sitting still on the edge of the bed, munching on the bread as he said, "Hurry up and eat, we have to get back to the tower today and you have to go and get Lena checked out too, don't try to sneak away."  
"I'm not one to sneak off." I got out of bed and went to the yard to wash up. The head is still a little dizzy, but it's much better than it was last night. There were no infected people as far as the eye could see outside the safety zone, but we still couldn't take it lightly, and Racine was right, we had to get back to the tower today.  
I looked up at the sky, blue as a wash. Large flocks of flying birds circled the tall buildings.  
Images began to flash before my eyes again, and I saw Racine, his exploratory suit soaked in blood, lunge towards me, his body smelling of blood and infected decay, and I saw his eyes, turning the infected's yellow, icy cold, inorganic quality.  
I think I'm really going to have to check with Lena.


	2. Chapter 2

On the way back I had no more hallucinations. After waiting to return to the tower and hand over the relief supplies to the Quartermaster, Racine stiffly dragged me to the medical room where Lena was stitching up a wounded man and we had to stand outside the door and wait.  
There weren't many people in the hallway, and the light from the overhead lights was a little weak, making it difficult to see into the darkness. Racine watched me stare off into one place, took my hand and asked, "How do you feel now? "  
"It's long gone." I smiled at him, "I'm Kyle Crane."  
Something in the darkness stared back at me, with a slimy, malevolent malice like substance dripping to the ground. I winced, my other empty hand unconsciously fingering the weapon hanging around my waist. Sweat rolled down the lines of my face, a cry from whoever it was rang in my ears, a shuddering sound, and the wound in my hand began to burn, almost to grow a flame from it.  
"Bang--"  
Before I could pull out my weapon, the door to the medical room was tapped open. Lena stepped out and looked at Racine and me, eyes drifting a few times over the hand we were holding and asked, "Who wants to see the doctor?"  
"Me." I dropped my hand and followed Lena. Racine followed suit, he looked around and went to one of the beds to help the man with the bandages, the man I hadn't seen before, that's normal, we people are basically out there every day gathering supplies and completing tasks, coming and going, not everyone has seen it either. Racine is not like me, Racine he knows all the people.  
As Lena sat behind the table, she looked up at me and asked, "What's wrong?"  
I sighed and suddenly didn't know where to begin, I was having a nightmare? I dreamed that Racine had become infected? Did I see myself kill Racine with my own hands? Oh, God, I don't even believe any of that.  
Finally I just said, "I started having visions yesterday and I saw .... . someone became infected. But he didn't. "  
Lena paused to write with her pen, "Crane, I think you know that a lot of people say they see people around them became infected, but they don't. Have you been too tired lately? I should have talked to Lyle earlier about giving you a few days off, you've been doing all sorts of high intensity tasks and it's time for a break. "  
"Actually, Lena, it's not that I'm too tired." I shook my head, "Like you said, a lot of people have hallucinated, maybe I'm just not used to this scene of infected people all over the place yet, in that case I should have gone on more missions instead of being scared out of my house like a coward by something false."  
Lena snorted, "You're still so brave. Do I remember that you have no history of smoking marijuana?"  
I still shook my head, in the past I'd been training for various programs, anything addictive was forbidden in order to keep my body at its best, the only thing I'd ever smoked was cigarettes, but in this world now, cigarettes were far more valuable to sell than to smoke yourself.  
"If not for the drug withdrawal reaction, then have you been experiencing anything lately that's... . not so good?" Lena looked at me, those black eyes full of inquiry.  
"I...." I finally sighed, I've sighed far more in the three months since the virus spread than the previous twenty-six, "I had a nightmare, just last night, I dreamed that Racine had become infected."  
Racine heard his name and looked to me. I knew he had been listening to this side of the conversation, and didn't avoid him, but instead flashed him a smile.  
Lena bowed her head and scribbled a few words in the casebook, nodding, "To be honest, Crane, I still think you've been too tired lately, you've been doing more tasks than everyone else in the tower. You'd better go to ask Lyle and take a vacation, then rest a few days on this side of the tower, and if he won't, come this way and tell me. "  
"Well, I'll think about what you suggest." I rubbed my nose and turned my head to take Racine's shoulder and walk out the door. Waiting in the hallway, Racine wrenched her hands away from mine and glared at me, "Why didn't you tell Lena you had a fever last night? Do you think you have the resurrection medicine?"  
"Racine, there's not much medicine in the tower." I glanced at my watch, twelve o'clock sharp, good, which meant I could go out and rob another batch of airdrops. "There's no need to go on anti-inflammatories just for a little fever, leave it to someone who needs it more."  
"Crane, you fucking individualist, you think you're a superhero? Do you know how many people have lost their lives to fever?" He yelled at me, then turned and headed for the room.  
I froze in place and watched Racine turn and enter the room without even seeing his back.  
I certainly know how many men have lost their lives to fever, Racine, and I have seen comrades driven to death alive by the heat when I was on the battlefield, but there is no need, no need to go on what would have been a pitifully small supply of medicine for the sake of a man like me. I thought of the way Lena looked at me, the way they were curious about my past despite trusting me, Racine was the only one who wasn't curious, he had said that whoever I was in the past, here, I was just Kyle Crane.  
I don't believe Lena's words, this illusion is not like other people's illusions, I know it's real, it's spying on me from somewhere, it's coming to report, it wants me to change this illusion.  
I followed and walked into the room as well.


End file.
